The time a lot of asylum seekers spend in custody is of the their own making.
Quote:
Lost at sea: 37 of 3237 boatpeople had passports
ASYLUM-SEEKERS are discarding their passports at soaring rates, sparking renewed calls for boatpeople to be penalised for destroying their identity documents in a bid to help their refugee claims.
Of the 3237 asylum-seekers who admitted to flying to Indonesia on a passport, 3200 did not have any travel documents when they arrived in Australia.
People-smugglers routinely advise their clients to discard their identity documents before arriving in Australia.
The refugee status assessment process operates primarily on a risk model, meaning there can be significant advantages to inventing false identities and claims of persecution.
The absence of documentation also makes it extremely hard to deport failed asylum-seekers, because receiving countries are reluctant to accept those whose nationality is not clear. But it complicates the refugee status assessment process, contributing to the length of time asylum-seekers are held in detention.
msolga there is only one solution to the boat people problem. Send them all back where they came from and make them apply to enter the Country through normal channels, like hundreds of thousands of us from Europe had to do! They only have to send one load back and there will be no more boats heading this way. Unfortunately we have weak leaders, both Labor and Liberal, who are unable to make strong decisions.
I agree with you on this one Dutchy. I think the threat of being sent back to Malaysia may have had some merit. Then the genuine ones could be admitted through the proper channels. Do it the right way as thousands have already done.
This is what gets me - illegal immigration via plane is tens of times more than illegal immigration by boats - but I never hear you antiboat guys screaming for govt blood to get rid of the ones who can afford a plane ticket.
The boats aren't any sort of a problem if you look at the numbers. I guess it's in the national psyche to panic (thank you David Maher). And then look sheepish and not talk about it when you realise what a fuss you made about stuff-all.
You might think "sending the boats back" is a great idea (I most definitely don't), but it's not going to happen.
Indonesia has made it very clear that it will not accept that, for starters. And I really doubt an Australian government (of either political persuasion) would risk so seriously straining Australia's relationship with our nearest neighbour, say nothing of other countries in SE Asia ...
... Say nothing of risking inevitable world-wide condemnation if any turning back those boats resulted in even further deaths of asylum seekers.
Besides, Australia is signatory to the UN Refugee Convention (which means accepting people who are seeking asylum) & I haven't seen any indication from either of the two main political parties that they want to withdraw from our obligations to the Convention.
In the meantime, according to both sides of politics, they agree that they want to save further loss of life at sea, but seem unwilling or unable to find a mutually agreeable way to achieve this.
I stand by my statement msolga. I know it will not happen as both major parties haven't got anybody with the guts to do it. We need a bloke like Bob Menzies who stood no nonsense and wouild have solved the problem, best PM this Country ever had.
It might have very little to do with neither having the guts to turn the boats back, Dutchy.
It might have more to do with other, more humanitarian considerations.
I have seen more than enough deaths at sea already. I don't want to see any more, say nothing of our government being directly responsible for them.
I think, along the lines of Robert Mann's thinking in his article (above) - in the absence of a more perfect solution, I am willing to consider some form of humane, UN -approved off-shore "processing", to avoid people having to make that dangerous journey by sea. Though not years of detention, as occurred at Nauru. By the way, most of those asylum seekers who were detained at Nauru were eventually accepted as refugees & settled in Australia anyway.
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0 Replies
hingehead
1
Reply
Sun 12 Feb, 2012 06:51 am
@Dutchy,
Hi Dutchy - I think you're selling Pig Iron Bob short - I think he would have much more humane and considered way of dealing this issue. Remember he saw first hand the exodus of European jews in the 30s & 40s. We used to be nicer people - or maybe it was just that the people in trouble were lighter skinned and minus epicanthic folds.
0 Replies
dlowan
1
Reply
Sun 12 Feb, 2012 07:21 am
@hingehead,
What he said.
0 Replies
Bootlace
1
Reply
Tue 14 Feb, 2012 12:43 am
@hingehead,
hingehead wrote:
This is what gets me - illegal immigration via plane is tens of times more than illegal immigration by boats - but I never hear you antiboat guys screaming for govt blood to get rid of the ones who can afford a plane ticket.
The boats aren't any sort of a problem if you look at the numbers. I guess it's in the national psyche to panic (thank you David Maher). And then look sheepish and not talk about it when you realise what a fuss you made about stuff-all.
The ones that come by plane have a passport. Checks can be made on passports. As soon as they land they don't dispose of their passports and seek asylum. So what is the alternative? Are you suggesting just let everyone in who comes on a boat ? Fine mess that would be.
I am not anti boat, I am anti anyone trying to jump the queue or make out they are persecuted when in fact probably most of them just want a better place to live. Do it the right way, go to an Australian embassy and apply to come here legally.
0 Replies
Bootlace
1
Reply
Tue 14 Feb, 2012 12:51 am
@Dutchy,
Dutchy wrote:
I stand by my statement msolga. I know it will not happen as both major parties haven't got anybody with the guts to do it. We need a bloke like Bob Menzies who stood no nonsense and wouild have solved the problem, best PM this Country ever had.
"Pig Iron Bob". You know, I always thought he had an unhealthy obsession with the Queen. He was besotted with her. He even wrote poetry about her. Britain came before Australia. I believe he had his loyalties reversed.
0 Replies
Bootlace
1
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Tue 14 Feb, 2012 01:05 am
@msolga,
People who are found to be refugees are eligible for protection in Australia, provided they satisfy health, character and security checks.
So why do they destroy documents that can prove their identity so security checks can be made? It makes me think the claims are not legitimate and in fact these people are jumping the immigration queue.
They had passports and visas when they flew into Indonesia.
They are disposed of and the boats sunk when near Australian territory.
We must be able to control our boarders otherwise it will be a free for all.
ps msolga, the boats won't get sent back because they make sure they sink them, but a plane trip back for the first 800 to Malaysia might stop them for a while. We did promise to take 4000 and they would be processed in Indonesia.
I think it was probably a workable solution.
.... But on to more important things (same things as before) ...:
Quote:
VIDEO:Clarke and Dawe with some Huge News Posted February 16, 2012 20:55:00
We meet the Section Editor of A Major Media Organisation with Clarke and Dawe with the reflection that The Position Could Not Be More Serious.
Clarke and Dawe: A7.30
@Bootlace,
Evidence please for why people smugglers would destroy their means of living?
Surely you aren't so naive to suggest that they don't ?
Quote:
Lost at sea: 37 of 3237 boatpeople had passports
ASYLUM-SEEKERS are discarding their passports at soaring rates, sparking renewed calls for boatpeople
to be penalised for destroying their identity documents in a bid to help their refugee claims.
Of the 3237 asylum-seekers who admitted to flying to Indonesia on a passport, 3200 did not have any
travel documents when they arrived in Australia.
People-smugglers routinely advise their clients to discard their identity documents before arriving in Australia.
The refugee status assessment process operates primarily on a risk model, meaning there can be significant
advantages to inventing false identities and claims of persecution.
The absence of documentation also makes it extremely hard to deport failed asylum-seekers,
because receiving countries are reluctant to accept those whose nationality is not clear.
But it complicates the refugee status assessment process, contributing to the length of time asylum-seekers are held in detention.
Many "boat people" HAVE been found to qualify for refugee status and entry.
Agreed
Quote:
Given that, kindly supply proper references for you claims.
I think you have been reading hate websites and believed them. Is that really who you are?
I believe we have the right to say who comes here and who does not.
It's no different from a stranger coming through your front gate, knocking on your door,
sitting on your steps and saying, " I don't like where I've come from, I am going to live with you"
Go to our embassies, apply for asylum. Hand over your passport and papers and be assessed.
If you are genuine, you will be admitted.
If you destroy your papers and means of identity, the process of of assessment will be a long
and difficult one.
So dlowan, are you suggesting boat people be admitted without checks or restriction ?
If not, what is your answer to the increasing number of "asylum" seekers?
I am exasperated, totally fed-up, with the ongoing media speculation about the leadership of the Labor Party/Government.
I have not seen anything quite like the vindictiveness & ruthlessness of the "political analysts" in the media in all the years I've followed Oz politics. Not since the Whitlam government, anyway. And that is saying something! I have seen various leaders of both parties removed & replaced by others, but generally the internal party machinations have remained fairly private. Internal to the respective party rooms. Was Turnbull's fall from grace at the hands of Abbott & co, "bloodless? I don't think so. Was Howard's purging of all the "wets" from the Liberal Party some polite affair above too much media scrutiny? I'm absolutely certain it wasn't. Howard removed the liberal from the Liberal Party. (remember why Don Chip formed the Democrats?) Howard was absolutely ruthless.
And remember when Bob Hawke replaced Bill Haydn as Labor leader? Remember Haydn's "drover's dog" comment?
Remember the famous 7:30 Report "blood on your hands" interview with Hawke?
My point is that these sorts of leadership changes are not unusual, or ever easy, or bloodless, in Oz politics & elsewhere. Politics can be ugly & ruthless & it often is.
So what is driving this particular "story"?
The way I see it, when Kevin Rudd chose not to fight to keep his job (because he realized he didn't have the "numbers') the polls were showing that Labor had lost quite a bit of ground. He was also on the nose within the Labor government due to his apparent inability to trust others to carry out their portfolio duties ... in other words, a control freak, who trusted no one but himself to do things properly.
For the record, I have no particular love of the NSW Right, which engineered Rudd's exit. I despise quite a few of them.
I also would have much preferred that Labor, under Julia Gillard's leadership, had stuck more closely to "traditional Labor values'.
But how to explain the non-stop speculation, the non-stop white anting of Julia Gillard's Labor government? The continual media frenzy .... this, as I said earlier, is completely different to anything I've witnessed before with a change of leadership, on either side of Oz politics. (And I do give her government credit for what it has actually achieved, with the support of the Greens & the independents, in the most difficult of circumstances.)
According to Barrie Cassidy, speaking on Melbourne ABC radio this week, the Canberra press is constantly being feed information from "the Rudd camp" of an imminent challenge to Gillard's leadership. Rarely, if ever, are the sources of these "stories" revealed, but despite numerous stories over the past few months, nothing has occurred, simply because Rudd does not have the support within cabinet & the back bench to make such a move.
The latest of such stories, according to Barrie Cassidy, was the next "blunder" the Gillard government makes, the challenge will happen.
Interesting, too, that Bronwyn Bishop has become such a source of pro-Kevin stories!
So this is what's driving our media? Including the likes of Michelle Grattan, who I used to have a lot of respect for (not any more) , despite her often conservative views.
This is what the leadership story is about? Threats of removal of the prime minister when the circumstances are right? This is intelligent news analysis? This is all the media can report? Heaven help us when we have even less independent media in this country!
Anyway <sigh> his was this morning's headline from ABC news:
For the first time I can recall, I absolutely agree with Christopher Pyne's assessment.
Though, of course he has his own reasons for making such statements. :
Quote:
“It’s quite un-Australian the way Kevin Rudd and his supporters are harrying and harassing Julia Gillard and not giving her a moment’s peace,” the opposition coalition’s Christopher Pyne said, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corp. “While that’s going on, the Australian people are not having their issues addressed.”
I somehow forgot to mention the months of leadership speculation surrounding these two. (How did I manage that? )
I can't recall anything nearly as hysterical at the time from the political journos.
And remember the relentless Hawke/Keating leadership speculation? We somehow got through that without the media going totally overboard.
<sigh> Anyway, last word: I would like the likes of Michelle Grattan, say nothing of the political commentators at the Australian, News Ltd, etc, to come clean and name the sources who who are fueling leadership speculation frenzy.
It's curious: today Nicola Roxon was named as yet another pro-Gillard supporter who has been (apparently) campaigning on her behalf. So why not name the pro-Rudd folk who are (apparently?) relentlessly feeding destructive stories to the press & fueling the speculation?
Who are they, Michelle & co? (Apart from Bronwyn Bishop, I mean. )
Fair's fair. You guys have been wring these stories for months & calling them "Labor sources".
OK, rant over. I needed to get to get this off my chest. I am really, really fed up!
You make a salient if unintentional point Olgs. I too am sick of it - but it isn't much different to the Costello/Howard speculation. And I wouldn't be surprised if it's Kevin's camp feeding it hoping for pressure from the public to support a challenge. Wrong tree barking.
The biggest hope the ALP has of surviving the next election is a combination of economic getting by and Tony Abbott remaining leader.
My point (and Deb's if I may be so bold) is that once they get here we have international legal obligations in dealing with them. You should thank your god that you don't live in Spain - they get 25,000 a year. Your head would explode. They are infinitely more compassionate than Australian shock jocks and joe public panickers.
Have you ever wondered why it's only a couple of thousand a year? Given that Australia is so wonderful and their lives are so ****? It's because it's fricking dangerous and you have to be desparate to even attempt it.
And guess what - some who get here through proper channels find out what a pack of racist arseholes we are and return to their homelands. A Sudanese taxi driver in Darwin explained that his brother had returned home because of our intolerance. The taxi driver had stayed because of his kids, who he thought might have a chance at better life than he. I wish I had his confidence, I've seen what dark skin can mean in God's own.
)
